Peking, 1900. Amidst the violence and terror of the anti-foreign Boxer Rebellion, a young China-born Englishwoman finds herself under siege alongside the city’s overseas population. Independent-minded and unaccustomed to European ways, Nina Ward embarks on an affair with married diplomat Oscar Fairchild, risking her future as death and despair draw ever closer. Journalist Alistair Scott records the controversy, trying to separate the reckless pair as the siege grows bloodier and the scandal grows louder. Based on real historical events, Dragons In Shallow Waters is a story of love, betrayal and secrets that reach across time and continents.
“Lush and sophisticated. This is a seamless melding of two illicit love affairs with the atrocious events in Peking in the summer of 1900. In elegant prose, Clare Kane vividly evokes the Boxer Rebellion catastrophe and deftly paints her characters in all their emotional complexity. The riveting story and its sympathetic characters will stay with you long after the final pages.” -Alice Poon, author of The Green Phoenix